Light Pollution
by Rossi Rose
Summary: From what I have seen, no one has addressed that light pollution would sharply drop with the failure of the power grid. This would allow us to see the surrounding galaxy in the way that the ancients used to see it. Lee takes Clementine outside at the motor inn one sleepless night so she can see the new night sky.


No matter how hard she tried, Clementine couldn't fall asleep. The sharp crack of distant gunfire or the creaking of the walls would startle the little girl out of her drowsy state any time she felt her exhaustion overtake her. Lee was always there for her anytime that she was scared or distressed but his latest supply run with Kenny was taking far longer than usual. Before bedtime, Clementine had been present when Duck asked his mother why his father had not returned home by nightfall. Not wanting to worry her son, Katjaa had assured 'little ducky' that everything was alright and Kenny would be back before he even knew it. Although Katjaa had convinced Duck, Clementine knew that what Kenny and Lee did on a daily basis was dangerous business and there may come a day when one or both of them would not return.

Clementine had attended church nearly every week with her parents before the whole world flipped on its head and she had never bought into the concept of prayer but figured that it wouldn't hurt to try to appeal to whatever god still presided over this broken world. "God, please keep Lee and Kenny safe. Amen," She whispers with a heavy sigh. Curling up into a ball for warmth, the little girl tugs her blanket closer up to her nose to try to catch a couple of hours of sleep.

An unknown deity must have answered the little girl's prayers because the clicking of the front door's lock jolts Clementine out of her dozing. The little girl snatches up her hat from the otherwise vacant bedtable and immediately flings herself out of bed to meet her caretaker. In her haste to reach the door before Lee opened it, Clementine trips over her own feet and hurtles towards the doorframe. It's just her luck that Lee opens the door just as Clementine's head connects with it. Falling backwards, Clementine yelps in pain and instinctually grabs at her bruised head. Lee is kneeling in front of her within a moment to try his best to soothe Clementine's pain and apologize for causing it in the first place.

"Oh shit, Clem, I didn't see you there! Are you okay? You're not bleeding, are you? Here, let me get that hat off so I can take a look."

Clementine reluctantly allows Lee to take off her treasured hat so that he can examine the severity of Clementine's injury.

Lee finally speaks after a few painful moments of his deft fingers sifting through her greasy, curly hair. "I'm no doctor but I think you'll be just fine. That blow is going to leave a bruise but you should be all right. We can take you to see Katjaa in the morning if you want to."

"No thanks, I'm fine." Clementine responds in a hushed voice while simultaneously trying to fight back the tears her injury had caused. She ordinarily would have been crying in this situation but she has since been trying to toughen up and not be quite so emotional. Fortunately, her training has proven useful as of late.

Lee plops her dirty hat back on her head, affectionately pulling the brim down over her eyes. Clementine pulls her cap back to look up at Lee and can't help but return his smirk with a beaming smile of her own.

"What are you doing up so late anyways, sweet pea? You should be in bed by now." Lee asks, nodding towards Clementine's messy bed.

"And you were supposed to be back hours ago. You worried me." Her words are proven to have the desired effect when Lee briefly winces.

"I know Clem and I'm sorry." Lee apologizes once again. He pauses for a moment before deciding to be truthful with the perceptive young girl. "Kenny and I tried to get home sooner but we saw an opportunity that we couldn't pass up. We ran into some trouble on the way back and we had to take care of it."

The fresh blood staining Lee's brown coat was a testament to the "trouble" that the two men had dealt with when returning to the motor inn. Clementine also couldn't help but wonder if the gunshots she had heard earlier had come from Lee's pistol.

"I don't care, I'm still upset that you're late." Clementine adamantly replies, crossing her arms to further display her irritation.

Lee simply lowers his head and sighs. "I just can't argue with you, can I?" Lee asked, not expecting an answer from the pouting child. "Here, you know what? I'll make it up to you." Lee stands up to his full height and gestures for Clementine to join him at his side. She does so and Lee wraps an arm around her shoulder as he leads her out of the room and into the courtyard.

Stepping out into the cold air, Clementine clutches her arms together across her chest in a bid to retain some warmth. Although she originally wanted nothing to do with the red hoodie Lee got for her, she can't lie to herself that it's a lot warmer than a thin dress. Clementine immediately spots Ben sitting on top of the RV with a rifle laying across his lap. Although he's supposed to be on watch to protect the motor inn, his attention is locked on the night sky instead of the surrounding tree line. Clementine also cranes her head backwards to look up at the sky and can only gasp at what she sees.

In Atlanta, only a stark few stars were visible at night. The adults would always talk about how the stars were innumerable but the sky only held a handful that Clementine assumed she would be able to count had she been able to stay awake long enough. But how the night sky was so much different now! Millions of small dots littered the night sky. Before tonight, all of the stars in the sky appeared as a monotone, uninteresting white. But now, all of the stars in the sky had their own unique shade of blues and reds. Not only were there millions more visible, but a thick, grey and orange line is painted across the dark sky. The bizarre cloud-like formation made her wonder if it was possible to slide along it like characters would do on rainbows in cartoons.

"Lee, why is the sky so… different?" Clementine whispers to the older man.

Lee responds to Clementine with a question of his own. "Why are you whispering?"

"It's so quiet. I didn't want to disturb the silence." The girl sheepishly admits which brings a chuckle to Lee.

"With everything that's happened, no one has been upkeeping the power grid that supplies electricity to the cities. Without electricity, you can't turn on the lights. Without people turning on the lights, there isn't any light pollution." Lee glances down to see the puzzled expression on Clementine's face. It was pretty easy to read what Clementine was thinking by the way her eyebrow arched when she was pondering something. "Light pollution is when the light reflects off of the atmosphere… or something…" Lee trails off midsentence to try to think of how to word his explanation, "Look, I don't understand it completely myself. All I know is that it's easier to see the rest of the night sky when there aren't any lights on in the surrounding area. That's why scientists set up observatories on mountains in the middle of nowhere."

"Hey guys, you really shouldn't be out here." Ben awkwardly calls out the pair, "Lilly would freak the fu- uh, I mean, she would freak out if she knew you guys were out of your rooms past lights out."

"We're only going to be out here for a minute. If you're so concerned about Lilly getting onto you, how about you actually do your job and watch the perimeter?" Lee quips, silencing the gawky teen.

Turning away from Lee, Clementine gazes back up at the light show above her head. Clementine recalls her father pointing out the only constellation he could recognize, "Orion's Belt". Clementine can only guess that the overwhelmingly bright blue stars arranged in a curved line are the same three stars her father had pointed out to her what felt like years ago.

"Is that Orion's Belt up there?" Clementine inquired, pointing up at the three shining stars.

Lee looks upward as well and takes a few seconds to find the constellation. "Yeah, I think that's the great hunter himself."

That's funny, Clementine had always thought Orion had bought the wrong pair of pants and needed a hefty belt to keep his pants from falling down. "Orion was a hunter?"

"Yeah, Orion was a famed hunter who had a nasty habit of bragging about his skills. Orion always boasted about how there wasn't an animal in the world that could kill him. The goddess Juno took him up on this challenge and sent a scorpion to lie in wait on a trail that Orion regularly took. Orion stepped on the scorpion and was killed by its venom."

"That's kind of sad but funny at the same time." Clementine comments when Lee has a break in his story.

"The goddess Diana didn't feel the same way you do though. She liked Orion quite a bit and wanted to honor his memory by having him immortalized in the stars. Juno argued that the scorpion should be given a constellation as well since it was the one to kill the accomplished hunter."

Clementine eagerly scans the stars but can't see anything even vaguely resembling a scorpion. "Where is the scorpion? I can't find it."

"The Romans said that Jupiter, the king of the gods, permitted the wishes of both of the goddesses but kept the two constellations as far away from one another as possible so there would be no further conflicts. Because the stars are so far apart, we can't see the Scorpio constellation right now. We'll have to wait until summer if we want to take a look at the scorpion that killed the mighty hunter."

Lee allows Clementine a few more minutes to enjoy the night before speaking again. "Come on, sweet pea. We could both use some shut eye."

Clementine reluctantly agrees after one final glance at the Orion constellation. Lee offers Ben a grateful nod before ushering Clementine back indoors.

Once inside, Clementine collapses on her bed and burrows under the blankets for warmth. Lee does not share this same luxury and instead has to groggily lock the door. He gives it a firm tug to ensure that the lock is engaged before heading over to tuck Clementine in for the night.

Clementine takes her hat off and ceremoniously places it on the nightstand next to her bed. Leaning down to tuck the blankets up to Clementine's chin, Lee takes a mental note to keep an eye out for a hair brush on his next supply run so that he can tame the girl's tangled hair.

With Clementine snugly bundled up in the sheets, Lee staggers over to the door that separates his room from hers. "Good night, Clem. Sweet dreams."

"Good night, Lee." Clementine whispers back before she succumbs to a dreamless sleep.


End file.
